Put another dime in the jukebox

It probably won't surprise you that I frequented one or two watering holes on my recent trek across America's Midwest. Finding dive bars where tourists don't frequent was easy peasy as the kind of places we went to (not counting Chicago or Los Angeles) were populated almost entirely by locals if not indigenous people.

Dive bars always have a bar the length of an aircraft hangar with stools housing firmly planted buttocks that aren't going anywhere anytime soon. Yes they sell Bud and yes they sell Miller, but now, thanks to something of an American craft beer renaissance, they also sell some killer IPAs - or APAs, depending on how you define the origin of your ales. Dive bars also have at least one pool table - some will have pinball machines - and they all have a jukebox.

Perched on a stool at Whiskey & June's in downtown Atascadero and I'm chugging a rather tasty strawberry blonde from the Barrel House Brewery (based in Paso Robles, CA I subsequently found out) and next up on the record machine I hear some quintessential Johnny Cash come bursting out of the speakers. No need to turn it up, it's already loud. Struggling to work out which album it's from - Unchained? American Man IV? (I really can't place it) I walk over to the back wall and peer thru the glass at the 'now playing' icon. 

Oops. Not Cash at all - but sounding more like the man in black than the man in black himself - I quickly grabbed some more dollar bills and put it on again. And again. I hope you like it as much as I did. (If so, next time you see it on a pub jukebox, feel free to play it three times back to back.)

Colter Wall - Sleeping on the Blacktop (2015)

"What were the skies like?"

James screen-grabbed part of their route for me 

That's neat

James and Janni are currently on their American roadtrip pulling in New Mexico, Arizona, Utah and California, rounding off in Los Angeles: living the dream. Photos are appearing regularly on my phone (RIP postcards) with mini updates. The old me would, I know, have had pins on a map in the kitchen, and everything; I so look forward to receiving these miniature travelogues every day or two.

Badboy

To give you a flavour - the photo on the right came thru with the caption 'Just driven this badboy from Albuquerque to Santa Fe!'
The one on the left - 'What were the skies like when you were young?*' We're at a really high altitude here so all the skies seem much wider, and I really got out of breath going or a swim earlier!

* Taken from the Orb's Little Fluffy Clouds

Pacific Coast Highway

It's on days like today I hanker for my favourite stretch of road. The Interstate 405 in California connects San Fernando and San Diego. It's particularly evocative in Summer - I first experienced it when visiting an old school friend of mine now living in San Diego: flying into LAX , jumping in a hire car and driving to within spitting distance of the Mexican Border beats your average UK commute hands down. Keeping the Pacific Ocean on your right hand side, you can't get lost. You pass Long Beach, Fountain Valley, Orange County in a heat haze. With the sun beating down, the air-con on full tilt and the radio dial locked onto Smooth Jazz 94.7, all's well with the world. Marc Antione wrote PCH in honour of it, but it's this tune that became the soundtrack to our first vacation over there and still makes the hairs on my neck stand to attention.

Marc Antoine: Sunland